I'm guessing only a little bit. CF still costs a lot and if BMW used extensive amounts of it, it would push the price up significantly. The M3 is BMW's bread and butter and sells more then any other M car.(X5/X6 M excluded) They have to keep it at a specific price point.

Ditch the M-DCT? What are you on? The M-DCT can snap shifts in I think 50-100ms(Someone correct me).That means there's less power loss and more power to the ground. You want a clunky 8 speed that gets confused and hunts for gears and can't make up it's mind, go get a IS-F. Stop with the smart ideas, bub.

LOL. Why would they need to "ditch" the M-DCT? It's good enough for the M5 & M6, and good enough for Ferrari.

The 8AT is great, but it ain't no M-DCT.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rated ///M

a

Ditch the M-DCT? What are you on? The M-DCT can snap shifts in I think 50-100ms(Someone correct me).That means there's less power loss and more power to the ground. You want a clunky 8 speed that gets confused and hunts for gears and can't make up it's mind, go get a IS-F. Stop with the smart ideas, bub.

Holy shit, I never said anything BAD about the DCT, I'm saying maybe BMW will go for something updated. Only referenced an 8-speed trans since the new 3 series is using one.

The M-DCT will be ~8 years old (according to the press release, we won't see the F80/F82 until 2016) so you need to think a little harder if you don't think there will be a better option out there.

It's only natural the next M3 will get a new gearbox, that rips out faster shifts, is lighter & yields more HP from the flywheel to the wheels. Rated ///M, you probably would've been the same person who said that the M-DCT is stupid because it has 7 gears. Now you're ripping out stats on it: Whatever BMW does, the next M3 will deliver & demolish the E92.

So a longer (and likely heavier) engine that extends further past the front suspension will bring back balance and handling?

How do you know the engine will be longer/heavier?? Pretty sure before the S54 came out, no one would expect a road car to have a V8 engine that was lighter than the I-6. We're talking about BMW here, they're going to do everything they can to make sure they achieve a 50:50 balance.

Quote:

Originally Posted by SamS

Yeah, M-DCT will be a little old, but what is better?

Who knows? It's not like there's a ZF transmission blog where people are hyped up to see what new trans they release & the specs on it. The current trans is phenomenal, its not the GTR gear box but I'd say its easily on par w/ the Porsche/Audi PDK system. I just don't see BMW recycling a gearbox (even if it's revamped & "upgraded" after the time it spends in the M5/M6) for a 3rd encore.

So a longer (and likely heavier) engine that extends further past the front suspension will bring back balance and handling?

^ this.

people need to keep in mind that balance doesn't necessarily go hand-in-hand with reduced weight. when you're squeezing the engine as rearward as possible, splitting the cylinders in half makes the engine shorter and easier to fit. a V-6 would allow for better balance in an overall smaller car or with a larger passenger area.

Quote:

Originally Posted by benzy89

How do you know the engine will be longer/heavier??

6 cylinders in a line are longer than 4 in a line. We know the engine will be longer. I will agree that we don't know it'll be heavier and I'd say it's highly unlikely that it will be heavier.

I welcome an I-6 because it's BMWs classic bread-and-butter design and I'm sure the car will have 50/50 balance because BMW M is just brilliant like that. I really hope the US doesn't get some version that leaves us wanting the euro version, though.

Yeah~ I figured..Emission laws always has to take away the fun! I just wanted the M3 to have an V8TT configuration to battle it out with Mercedes/Audi haha But if they up the displacement on the I6 to what the GTR has(3.8L, or even 3.6L), and slap on some midrange turbos - or 3 in this case, This, I'd love to get into!

Yea the n54 is a great motor idk why you would say heaven forbid. If this thing is bored and stroked out to a 3.3L, 3.5L its going to be amazing.

New fueling system
New cooling system
New turbos
Exhaust manifolds for the n54

And it is a very strong motor if you havnt seen the 750 hp 335 now being built, this motor is great!!!

More than likely, this is what BMW will do. The N54 was "killed off" because it lacked the reliability & emissions that the N55 was able to deliver. But somehow it keeps resurfacing -- 1st in the 335is, then in the 1M, and now in the 135is.

The high horsepower 335s are the single turbo applications (I haven't seen any RB/upgraded twin turbos going over mid-500 unless they're running meth), so I think BMW will stick with 2 (or 3) to prevent turbo-lag & try get the motor as close to the naturally-aspirated feeling as possible.

I wonder if asking for a 3.3 or 3.5L I6 with 2 turbos is asking for too much now, our expectations are so low already.
If they came out with 3.0l I6 TT (basically a new N54) would we be shocked? The M5 is only 4.4l V8 TT that is shared (soon) with the 550i. If you buy a benz AMG you at least still get a 5.5l V8 TT which is different from the 4.7l in the 500/550 class models.
Given that the target hp is only 450hp, 3.0l is not unimaginable, especially given how cheap BMW has proven recently, why bother creating a 3.3 or 3.5l engine? Unless there could be a use for it down the line, which is not unimaginable given the large gap that exists between the 3.0l I6 T and the 4.4l V8 TT.
This could make the 4.4l V8 NA M3 GTS seem like such a gem in retrospect.

A V6 can be understood as two Inline 3 cylinder blocks, side by side, also both aligned with the car lengthwise, connected to each other at a "V" angle.

In practical terms, the V6 is a much shorter engine (almost half the length) that is much easier to fit into cars that might also be available with I4 or V8 engines. Since it is shorter you can also make the argument that it can contribute to a more rearward (favorable) weight distribution because its not so long like the I6 where much of the engine is in front of the front axle.

However, the I6 is a naturally balanced engine which means that without adding any additional mechanical complexity it has the potential to run smoother, has the potential to be built so that it can be tuned to create higher power because there is less stress on the components, and has the potential to be built to sound better.

The V6 is a particularly unbalanced engine where typical designs add a lot of mechanical complexity and weight in order to cancel out some of the vibrations and roughness, and even after that some of the vibrations are just tolerated as there is no easy way to cancel them out.

As a reference, the V8 isn't naturally balanced either but it isn't as bad as the V6 and all the imbalances can be relatively easily canceled out with modifications to the basic mechanical design, so a typical V8 is very smooth like an I6.